Triton reboots its widely vexed campaign for “artificial gills”

Outfit refunds all backers, and explains how the device will work.

A controversial Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign that offers "artificial gills" for a mere £210 (~$299) has taken an unexpected turn: the company behind the so-called Triton project has issued refunds to all its backers.

Having raised around £619,000 ($883,000), and received a more than sceptical response from the scientific and diving communities, the outfit has now added a more detailed explanation of its technology, and has already attracted—at time of writing—£167,000 ($238,000) from 600 people in a new campaign.

In the initial Indiegogo campaign, which was launched in March, the Sweden-based team advertised a 29×12cm underwater breathing device that could apprently be used for 45 minutes at a depth of up to 15ft (4.57m).

As for the technology behind the project, the only details were that "the Microporous Hollow Fiber makes breathing underwater possible. The holes of the threads are smaller than water molecules, they keep water out and let oxygen in. The micro compressor then extracts and stores the oxygen—allowing you to breathe naturally, and revel in your underwater freedom."

Further Reading

The campaign quickly raised more than 10 times its £35,000 ($50,000) goal, but it also prompted criticism from scientists, and divers, who challenged the company's claims about the tech.

A rough calculation showed that in order to create enough oxygen for the user to at least survive, let alone swim, the device would need to process no less than 42 litres of water per minute. This seemed hardly achievable for a plastic-looking device of this size, and price.

“You have to both run a lot of water through your product, and have a means to separate it,” Dr. Neal Pollock, a hyperbaric medicine and environmental physiology research associate at Duke University, told GearJunkie. “They have some kind of filter system they say works with a membrane. But what entices the oxygen to go through that membrane? The explanation is not compelling.”

Scampaign or not?

Following the controversy about the product, which led to Indiegogo's team reviewing the campaign, Triton posted a lengthy update, and announced that it had issued refunds to all of its 2,000-odd backers.

In addition to that, the team added some details about the way Triton was supposed to work, and effectively relaunched the company from the scratch.

"Since launching we have been protecting our proprietary technology because it’s so important to our success, but after careful consideration we think it’s important to share these details and clarify how the device works," the campaign update said. "Inside of each Triton, the artificial gills utilise 'liquid oxygen,' which combined with the other components allow users to breathe underwater, which you can see in the video above. […] Note that the 'liquid oxygen' cylinders won’t last forever so we plan to make it possible for backers to purchase and exchange cylinders through our website."

Triton co-founder and CEO, Saeed Khademi, added in the comments section on Indiegogo's website: "Triton works with artificial gills and liquid oxygen, we never said that Triton only works with liquid oxygen, we said that the second component that makes Triton works is liquid oxygen."

It's not clear whether the cylinders actually contain liquid oxygen, but it would seem that the words were wrapped in quotation marks for a reason. The final price of the cylinders, meanwhile, is yet to be determined. Triton also said it was working on making them refillable.

In order to prove that the "artificial gills" could work, Triton posted an almost 13-minute long video without cuts showing a person seemingly breathing through the device at the bottom of a pool:

The video is shorter than the world breath-holding record of 22:22 minutes, but it appears to be legit, as the person filmed moves a lot, and doesn't generally seem deprived of oxygen.

There's no information available as to whether the full refund was a goodwill gesture from Triton, or a request by Indiegogo's staff. Neither Triton nor Indiegogo were immediately available for comment at time of publication.

Be it as it may, Triton's second attempt at crowdfunding appears to be quite successful. The company has promised to ship Triton in December 2016—when the final judgement can be made on the legitimacy of its claims.

Update: Indiegogo has provided Ars with the following statement: “Indiegogo’s global community of backers asked for more specific details about how the product would work. Indiegogo’s Trust & Safety team encouraged the Campaign Owner to relaunch the campaign with the additional product requirements clearly stated, which they have done.”

Andrii Degeler
Andrii is a contributing reporter at Ars Technica UK, covering a wide range of topics from policy to hardware and crowdfunding. He holds a master's degree in Journalism from the University of Groningen, the Netherlands. Emailandrii@proceed.to//Twitter@adegeler